A lifelong resident of Western PA, Jack graduated from Duquesne University with a degree in music education. Following college, while substitute teaching and selling pianos part time, he began going to the Ligonier Valley Study Center as often as possible to study with Dr. R.C. Sproul. Acting on advice from R.C., he then went to Pittsburgh Theological Seminary to study with Dr. John H. Gerstner. He received the Master of Arts degree magna cum laude completing his work there with a thesis on the Puritans on Marriage.

Dr. Gerstner had advised Jack to consider the ministry but he did not believe himself to be called and pursued other work including Equitable Insurance, Gimbel’s Portrait Studios, and McDonalds. Over time, Jack and his family began to reconsider whether the Lord was calling him to pastoral ministry. The session of the church they were then members of, the Presbyterian Church of Pitcairn (PCA) invited Jack to serve as an interim pastor after the Rev David Williams left to start a new church in Chicago. That interim position lasted two years following which Jack served for three years as an Associate Pastor at First Reformed Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Penn Hills and began teaching part time at Trinity Christian School.

Jack was then called to Covenant Orthodox Presbyterian Church as an interim pastor beginning in September of 1989. In a very short time the congregation called him as pastor and he was installed after the process of transferring his ministerial credentials from the PCA to the OPC. Jack continued to teach New Testament, Reformed Doctrine, and Ethics at Trinity Christian School for six more years until he and the session decided it was necessary for him to devote himself full time to the church. He continued at Covenant until the merger with New Hope PCA when he became the founding pastor of New Covenant PCA.

Jack and his wife Connie, an Administrative Assistant for PNC, live in Murrysville. Their daughter, Rachel, a chemist for PPG, lives in Pittsburgh.